John Roberts Quotes & Sayings (Page 2)

“I go to the opera. It's mostly my wife that's a bigger fan, I'd say, than I am. I like the big opera. I want a lot of people on stage, elephants and marching stuff, and the modern stuff I don't care for.”

“The Affordable Care Act's requirement that certain individuals pay a financial penalty for not obtaining health insurance may reasonably be characterized as a tax.”

“There is no better gift a society can give children than the opportunity to grow up safe and free - the chance to pursue whatever dreams they may have.”

“When I worked in the Department of Justice, in the office of the solicitor general, it was my job to argue cases for the United States before the Supreme court. I always found it very moving to stand before the justices and say, 'I speak for my country.'”

“I don't type on the computer or edit. Law students who went to law school really just a couple years after I did were brought up all on the computers and that's how they do it, but I was still part of the older school.”

“You can't fight for your rights if you don't know what they are.”

“If children do not understand the Constitution, they cannot understand how our government functions, or what their rights and responsibilities are as citizens of the United States.”

“When we go to a restaurant, they don't ask, 'Do you want the asbestos section or the non-asbestos section?' They do ask, 'Do you want smoking or nonsmoking?'”

“While some of the tales of woe emanating from the court are enough to bring tears to the eyes, it is true that only Supreme Court justices and schoolchildren are expected to and do take the entire summer off.”

“A chief justice's authority is really quite limited, and the dynamic among all the justices is going to affect whether he can accomplish much or not. There is this convention of referring to the Taney Court, the Marshall Court, the Fuller Court, but a chief justice has the same vote that everyone else has.”